Aftermarket Intake Modding, help me out.

[dickie]

I bought my car with an aftermarket intake on it. The po said he started experiencing the car running hot almost as soon as he installed it, and i can see why; the aem short-ram style intake sits pretty close to where the stock airbox assembly was, but its an open cone which means its drawing in air from right in front of the exhaust manifold .

i dont want to track the plastic oem part down, and i dont want to go to the trouble of buying a new intake, so i decided that i would do some work to what i have. first off, the intake is polished. i hate it. so i want to sand it, prime it, and paint it with POR-15 velvet black. would that reduce some of the issues that metal tube intakes have with heat-sink? or would the dark paint absorb more heat than it does now?

second, i want to fab some sort of heat shield to fit behind and beside the cone filter, kind of like what comes with k&n's intake kits. is this worth the time and work?

thirdly, im pretty sure that no matter which way i go, im going to wrap the tube in heat insulation tape. i know it will be ugly but if it helps i dont care.

im not going after hp gains, im simply trying to get back some of what i am losing due to the poor design of this type of intake. if it comes down to it, i may just try and fab my own intake out of parts i have lying around the garage, but i need to do more research on the maf and how it needs to be setup to work properly before i do that. any suggestions?

this is closest to what i have

alternatively to building my own heat shield, i might get something like this and paint it with the same por 15 heat resistant paint

heat shield

[Kenrik]

First off! the air is going through it so fast that the heating of the aluminum pipe should not effect it that much! As far as the Filter what I think you should do is pipe in down into the front bumper compartment and have a small rubbermaid or plastic bin bolted in there so if you go through a puddle you will not suck water into your engine this way you are getting the coolest air possible!

Overheating... from an intake? I doubt that is the cause! it's more likely your Rad or your waterpump is going check your coolant system before you mess with the intake... also since you bought the car from someone else you should flush the coolant system anyway. hope this helps!

[dickie]

yeah its not overheating because of the intake... its not overheating at all. as far as i can tell his hoses all look good, the coolant is clean, it does heat up to operating temp fast, but thats ok. i do want to do some sort of cold air attachment, whats the easiest way to get this done well? i dont want a dryer hose or random crap that doesnt belong in there.

hmmm... what i really need is more piping the same diameter and some way to attach it to what i have in there already. any ideas? also if anyone has pictures of their home-made cai extension, post them please! MOTOP had an idea but there werent any pics and little details.

thanks

[miked808]

Wrap your Intake tube with Exhaust Wrap to keep some Heat out. Also if stock airbox is removed cut a nice size hole in the sheet metal. I did it with a sawzall and put a 90deg extension on with some left over bends I had. Now my Intake filter is Half In the Engine Bay and Half way in my fender well. Sucks in cold air and sounds meaner because Its literally outside the bay. Heat Soak sucks I picked up an eighth in the Quarter Mile when I Iced my Intake Tube and Manifold. By that I mean I put bags of Ice on my Intake Manifold and Intake tube while I'm waiting to stage. Its nice to have a couple of friends to push my car through the lines, remove the bags, start her up and go. Learned that when I used to drive 5.0s. If you ever drove your car on a Hot Day and then On a Cold Night you will know how it felt. Like its not even the same Car!

[dickie]

mikeD! thanks for the info, i havent seen any evidence that this car ever overheated, so i think the po/i probably meant to say heat-soak. mkay have you got any pics of your intake setup? if its top secret you can email it to me

where did you get the extra piping to run your filter outside of the bay?

and kenrick one of the first things im going to do on my day off is flush the coolant system, hopefully it will take a lil longer for the car to get hot. so many things to do and so little time do them

[wilfonzo]

i dont really know much about the weather in texas, but id have to say its safe to bypass the TB coolant line.

[miked808]

My Son broke my Digital Camera so no pics right now, but its not Top Secret I just had some 2 1/2 inch Pipe from a local speed shop I had lying around. The Hole I cut in my Engine Bay is big enough for a VolleyBall to pass through. When I lift my Hood You are staring at my Driver side Tire. As for Coolant, after the Flush just use Distilled Water and One Bottle of Redline Water Wetter. Car runs Cooler and always is Peppy.

[dickie]

is this a summer-only mix, you know it DOES get down to the teens here in winter :P

ps is your car slightly raked?

[miked808]

When it starts to get cold just add a little Antifreeze. No my cars not raked. The C-West front end is Low.

[Kenrik]

if you listen to miked808 and myself about pipeing it down into the fender well then make sure to mount some type of plastic bin or something down there to so if you go through a deep puddle of water you don't **** your engine up!

[dickie]

miked: looks good, i was going by the body/tire gap

kenrick: i would probly end up doing some kind of permanent water shield and doing the radiator airflow guides at the same time

the thing thats stopping me is, all i can find as far as tubing is online and its kind of something i want to manually inspect to make sure it would work/where it would go.

2nd since i still have not seen pics im guessing you guys either relocated the maf with the filter or used a second adapter and made the maf inline between hte 2 tubes? which one is it?

[InsanityInc]

The MAF can be wherever, it doesn't matter. Also, no, your metal pipe or intake being under your hood won't cause you to lose any power. Your intake charge is WAY hotter than your underhood temperature. Underhood temps are ususally around 70C, the intake charge is usually above 300C.

[miked808]

The MAF is between the two tubes. As far as piping goes any Muffler shop has Bends and Piping in Diameters from 2 to sometimes 4 in. Just Measure your Pipe Diameter and they will probably sell you some cheap. Its never more than just a couple of bucks. And to be Honest I never measured Underhood Temps vs. Ambient Temp. but with aftermarket Headers and what not under my hood it gets very hot and now with the Intake pulling Ambient air from the fender if I had to guess its at least 50 degrees cooler. As stated before Drive your car on a 90 degree day and a 75 degree day and you can feel a difference now Since my car operates around 190 degrees I would Imagine Under Hood Temps. can't be much cooler than that so Imagine a Swing of Power when your sucking in 190 degree air vs. whatever temp it is outside. Plus I'm generally moving while in the car so Intake temps are probably 100 degrees cooler than under hood. Basically All I'm talking about is making a Ghetto Cold Air System but Performance wise for the 20 bucks I spent on Piping and couplers the High End Power and Slight Power boost it provides is second to none.

Modified by miked808 at 7:08 AM 9/11/2005
Modified by miked808 at 7:19 AM 9/11/2005

[dickie]

thanks insanity , kenrick, miked. ill let you know what happens.